Sammy Davis Jr with his guns Video!

Fun stuff, I never knew anything about this...though he is slightly ahead of me generationally.

It's entertaining.... Hopefully it's not closed as a driveby.
 
It has been so long ago now, that we forget how popular fast draw/quick draw was in the 1950s, coincidentally with the popularity of TV westerns. While in a way the TV westerns replaced the B-westerns of the 1940s, they developed quite differently and gradually developed into what were called adult westerns. In any event, fast draw was quite a craze in the late 1950s and several TV actors were quite good at it.

The sport developed along two lines, one being a walk-and-draw competition that used blanks, another that used live ammo. There were even those that believed Western-style fast draw with single action revolvers and Hollywood holsters had real-life practical application. These fast draw competions were one of the ancestors of both today's shooting games and even some forms of practical pistol training. There was at the same time very much police-oriented pistol competition, invariably using .38 Special Colt and S&W revolvers, which I would say evolved in a parallel universe, so to say, but today the two things have become interwoven.

Then along came Cowboy Action Shooting.
 
Jerry Lewis was also a very slick gunhandler. Hollywood stars used to attend fastdraw competitions in the '60s, to promote their TV westerns. By "attend", I don't mean showed up to watch.
 
Jerry Lewis, Sammy Davis Junior, & Dean Martin were all vary fast.

The actor Cliff Robertson was a very fast draw and apparently a very good shot,,,
He played in many cowboy movies and did all of his own gun-handling.

I knew a few old stunt-men from the 40's and 50's,,,
They said James Arness was probably the slowest at the draw.

They also told me that half the time when Richard Boone made a fast draw,,,
He threw the gun halfway across the set.

Aarond

.
 
"I like the fun of reaching for a gun and going bang bang bang" :) that brought back some memories. He was great, the older guys were much better than todays actors.
 
Most of the Hollywood fast draw actors were trained by famed shooter and holstermaker Arvo Ojhala.
That's him facing Matt Dillon in the opening credits of "Gunsmoke".

He said that of all the fast draws, THE fastest he ever saw was..... Audie Murphy.
He said that Murphy was not only the fastest, he could actually shoot and hit with live ammo that fast.

When Murphy first came to Hollywood he stayed at James Cagney's house.
Murphy figured he needed to know how to shoot a single action for the movies so he got a pair of Colt's and started going up into the hills behind Cagney's house and shooting.
They said that within a couple of weeks, Murphy had mastered the single action like no one they ever saw.
 
There are a couple of good videos on Youtube of Sammy Davis, Jr. showing off his gun handling skills. Very impressive. Remember reading that he was considered the best of the Hollywood crowd in handling a gun, but Jerry Lewis was the fastest draw.
 
I'd never heard that about Jerry Lewis. I do recall an episode of Ozzie and Harriett in which one of the boys got interested briefly in fast draw. Oddly enough, a few years later, Ricky Nelson starred in a western with John Wayne and Dean Martin. Ricky and Dean Martin even managed to get in a duet together. They both did some singing now and then, you know. Also in the movie was Ward Bond and Walter Brennen.

A few other movie stars and supporting actors were also known for their interest in guns, probably the best known being Robert Stack. A supporting actor in the 1940s and 1950s named Frank Furguson also was a shotgunner and was featured in a magazine article about a shotgun that came with liners for the barrels so smaller gage shells could be used.

Older westerns were for the most part nothing like the westerns of the 1950s and later and it may be that their gear was more authentic. Some of the early western movie actors had been real cowboys. Some of the later ones got into acting by starting out as wranglers at a time when a lot more horses were used in movies.

One of the funniest descriptions of an early fast draw method from the westerns was the "Gabby Hayes draw," in which you grabbed the holster with one hand and drew the revolver with the other. But John Wayne certainly looked pretty fast in some of his early B-Westerns. Perhaps the so-called Hollywood holster is older than I think.
 
I’ve posted this before but it is still one of my favorite stories about James Arness playing a practical joke on a new director of the hit TV show Gunsmoke. The story is from TV Guide.

It was the first season the show would be filmed in color. On the first day of shooting they redid the show's memorable opening scene---Marshal Matt Dillon stepping out into the main street of Dodge City for a fast draw showdown with a bad guy.

The new director shouts "action", James Arness steps out into the street, the bad guy draws, James draws, shots ring out and James Arness sprawls backwards into the dust clutching his chest from which blood is apparently gushing.

I think the director said that at that moment he thought he might as well be dead too.
 
On the Western Channel they used to play a video of a song called "Silver Screen Cowboys" great stuff. Hop-a-long Cassidy, Lash Larue, Gene Autrey,
The Lone Ranger, The Cisco Kid. Yeah, baby.
 
I met Sammy Davis when he visited our base overseas. He was a highly talented man and very personable. We pilots enjoyed him and he enjoyed us.

I found his coordination and quick wit fascinating, while marvelling at his balance and ability to dance with such balance, particularly since he only had one eye.
 
I saw an old episode of "The Rifleman" recently where Sammy Davis Jr. played a gunslinger.
He definitely had some moves. :)
 
Sammy Davis Jr interview

I remember Sammy Davis being interviewed one time and he said he liked to play golf. He was asked what his handicap was and he responded: I'm a one eyed black Jew married to a white woman and you want to know what my handicap is!!!
 
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